I just got another email promising me targeted leads. It's aggravating to keep getting these emails, but it is funny.
I put these in the same classification as the ones I get from the widow in Africa and the other phishing schemes.
I do not believe in buying leads - especially ones that I didn't request - for two very important reasons:
(1) no one knows exactly what I'm looking for in a referral or how I might develop a lead into a sale. A service appraching me and wanting me to buy leads from them would only be guessing. They don't know anything about what I need my next sale to look like - for the simple fact that I haven't shared it with them. There's no way they can know. I don't know who they are, and they certainly don't know me. We've never met, and I have not engaged them to perform this service for me.
(2) I don't believe in paying for something that is my responsibility. Part of my job description - a very large part - is generating new business. I'm happy to take referrals, but the onous for producing business is mine. I can't assign that to anyone else except people that I employ and have trained just for this.
I do wish that the people in the lead selling business would get into a legitimate business to use their sales talents more productively.
Now, if you really do need some help in generating leads, I can definitely give you some ideas and point you in the right direction - but then it would be up to you to follow-through and actually produce them, just as it is for me.
───
For more information on my coaching and educational programs and services, visit my website stevehoffacker.com, or go to my other blog homesalesinsights.com for additional sales tips, insights, and commentary. Listen to my free podcast messages at Steve Hoffacker's Happenings.
Steve Hoffacker - Consultant, Coach, Author, Blogger, Photographer, Motivator, Teacher, & Strategist - for Realtors, Real Estate Sales Professionals, Home Builders, New Home Salespeople, Entrepreneurs, Small Business Owners, and Independent Sales Representatives.
© Steve Hoffacker, 2011. All Rights Reserved.
Face it Steve.
YOU are a targeted lead.
So am I. I was targeted by Trulia today.
Thanks Steve...within my 20+ yr career i have shyness when accepting "lead generating" promises..for so much per month or per lead. One time i was given phone numbers and names...i recall calling a number and the man on the other side of the call told me i was calling his 12 y/o daughter's cell phone and they lived in Detroit, Mi.....Im in Chicago ! Needless to say, it wasnt that easy to cancel the account and i eventually had to cancel my credit card account to get them off my back...
No longer since then have i responded to those scams....best wishes to you.....Mike
Perhaps we wouldn't see so many pursuing us if it were not for the always "green" newbies that are the real targets. I don't receive near the solicitations I did the first year; like you, I do still get them. I haven't been scammed on lead generation but I did buy into adversting that never delivered. I am wiser. School of hard knocks and the predators know it. Thanks, Steve, for putting this out there.
Steve, Didn't anybody tell you that the lead companies have been taken over by the Nigerians? LOL
Lenn,
That's true. Being visible does make it easy for those that have little or nothing to offer. :)
Steve
Mike,
How hard is for someone to photocopy a page out of the phone book and sell it to us as "leads"? Of course they are leads - for something, at sometime, maybe. No thank you. :)
Steve
Teral,
Thanks for adding your experiences. I get way too many of these but I ignore them all. :)
Steve
Gary,
Oh, so that's it? :)
Steve
Steve,
That widow has a lot of peers. All of them are going to make me rich, just for using my bank accounts.
I think your odds may be better with the widows.
Then there is the other route to riches, I got a call last week, for a fee they put me on a list to do BPO's. Try as I might he wouldn't listen when I told him I didn't do BPO. He told me not to worry about it they're easy any one can do them. I had to hang up to get ridde of him.
Bill
Somebody must be buying these targeted leads or they would simply go out of business…
Steve
It's far more effective to generate our own leads.
Good luck and success.
Lou Ludwig
There are LEAD GENERATORS of sorts for property managers....a monthly fee for them to list you on their website AND send you clients FIRST....I'd rather do it the OLD FASHIONED way and direct mail to absentee owners of properties in DESIRABLE rental areas.
Steve, I always find it interesting how they tell you they don't "sell" leads but they do charge a service fee up front! The last proposal I got was charging $500 upfront per listing appointmet... I can buy a whole lot of postage for that and get the same results or better ;-)
I just ignore all these lead generating companies that make all of these promises for what they call no fee and it is just the opposite.
Bill,
Such scams! :)
Steve
Paul,
The same with the widows and African businesspeople. :)
Steve
Lou,
Effective and productive. Thanks. :)
Steve
Wallace,
There again, they aren't doing any screening so you are just paying for something you can do better yourself. :)
Steve
Silvia,
It's amazing how telemarketers think that they aren't selling! :)
Steve
Stella,
It's one-sided or they wouldn't be calling us. :)
Steve